Javier Perez de Cuellar

Javier Perez de Cuellar (19 January 1920-) was Secretary-General of the United Nations from 1 January 1982 to 31 December 1991 (succeeding Kurt Waldheim and preceding Boutros Boutros-Ghali) and Prime Minister of Peru from 22 November 2000 to 28 July 2001 (succeeding Federico Salas and preceding Roberto Danino Zapata).

Biography
Javier Perez de Cuellar was born in Lima, Peru in 1920, and he studied law and entered the Peruvian diplomatic service. He served in France, the United Kingdom, Brazil, and the Soviet Union, and in 1971 became Peru's ambassador to the United Nations. In 1979 he was appointed UN Under-Secretary for Political Affairs and in 1981 Secretary-General to succeed Kurt Waldheim. He was unable to resolve peacefully the dispute which led to the Falklands War in 1982, but was more successful in his mediation of the Iran-Iraq War in 1988, and the resolution of the war in Namibia in 1988. He left the post of Secretary-General in 1991, and was succeeded by Boutros Boutros-Ghali. In 1995, Perez unsuccessfully ran against Alberto Fujimori for President of Peru, but, following Fujimori's resignation over corruption charges, he served as Prime Minister from 2000 to 2001. He left politics in 2004.